University of Houston Athletics
Swimming and Diving to Start Season at SMU
10/20/2010 12:00:00 AM | Swimming & Diving
Oct. 20, 2010
HOUSTON - The University of Houston swimming and diving team prepares to open its season at defending Conference USA Champion SMU on Friday.
After undergoing their final tune-up at the Rice/UH Carnival last Friday, the Cougars are set to start their season at nationally-ranked power SMU. The Mustangs held the No. 19 spot in the CSCAA Division I Team poll to end the season last year and will provide quite the task as the season opener for the Cougars.
"They are a perennially nationally ranked team," head coach Mark Taylor said. "Their coach (Steve Collins) has been there for a very long time and has a pipeline set up for recruiting and boosters and things like that. He's an excellent coach. His team is mostly from Europe and he has numerous NCAA qualifiers."
One of which is the 2010 C-USA Swimmer of the Year Therese Svendsen. The junior returns after winning the league's individual titles in both the 100-yard and 200-yard backstroke events, setting C-USA Championship records in the process.
The Cougars will answer with last season's C-USA Freshman of the Year Reka Kovacs, and juniors Beccy Hillis and Kim Eeson. Kovacs and Hillis each tote conference championships of their own into Friday's meet and Eeson enjoyed multiple successes against the Mustangs in 2010.
Eeson notched the first of five event wins for the Cougars in their last dual meeting in the 1,000-yard freestyle. Eeson posted UH's third-fastest time in the event against SMU with a 10:27.32. She also turned in a second-place effort in the 500-yard freestyle.
Hillis swam the 200-yard breaststroke just four seconds behind her personal best against the Mustangs (2:18.65) to claim first-place honors in the event. Kovacs and senior Andrea Kells locked down second-place performances in the 200-yard backstroke and the 200-yard butterfly, respectively.
"I think they'll each have good showings against them this year, too," Taylor said. "Those girls that have been in the program for a while know exactly what they need to do and will go and do it."
On the diving side, the Cougars owned both the 1-meter and 3-meter events thanks to 2010 NCAA Diver of the Year Anastasia Pozdniakova. Senior and returning NCAA All-American Lacey Truelove, junior Jessalyn Almond and sophomore Julia Lonnegren will look to repeat the graduated senior's performance.
"It's early in the season, so we're going to try to go up there and compete," head diving coach Jane Figueiredo said. "We love competing against SMU, they're one of our main rivals. (Going into Friday's competition) Lacey looks great and Julia is learning a few new dives on the 3-meter. So, we're not quite there on the 3-meter, but we're going to go up there and see what we've got."
The Cougars closed last year's conference dual with a thrilling win the in the 400-yard freestyle relay, the same event UH won last Friday to end the exhibition meet against Rice. Eeson, Kells and sophomore Kimmy Ballo all return from the relay team that beat SMU in 2010.
"It will be a very exciting event," Taylor said. "We're going to have a shorter, 200-yard relay, too, that should get things going. It's going to be a lot closer dual meet. We've got so much depth this year with the freshmen that have come in, that we feel very positive about the lineup that we've going to have there. We're going to surprise SMU a little bit."
The meet is scheduled to start at 5 p.m. in SMU's Perkins Natatorium.
Players Mentioned
